Steve Schmidt
Morning Joe absolutely unloads on Elizabeth Warren this morning. The proximate cause was the release of her memo on behalf of a corporate client seeking to avoid responsibility for cleaning up a toxic-waste site. But the broader issue addressed was her lack of authenticity/honesty across the board. John Heilemann says her campaign realizes there's a "whiff of fraudulence" about her, and Steve Schmidt twice warns Democrats against nominating her.
Whether it was Lyin’ Brian still having a job, an array of takes on Joe Biden’s latest gaffe, Joy Reid suggesting unifying the country wasn’t important, or Michael Moore being Michael Moore, MSNBC’s post-debate coverage had it all late Wednesday and early Thursday. And in the closing segment, their final thoughts started off on well with Hardball host Chris Matthews warning Democrats for alienating Americans on cultural issues and often being too demeaning to America as an idea. But things were quickly thrown away by Moore, Reid, and Schmidt.
Late Wednesday night, MSNBC’s post-2020 Democratic debate panelists were locked and loaded, offering praise for South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s “exceptional” and “pretty flawless debate performance,” the sitting U.S. Senators for having done “very well,” and Cory Booker set to gain in the polls. At the other end, panelists trashed former Vice President Joe Biden for a “colossal gaffe” about African-American women Senators and Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (HI) for being “just awful,” “dishonest,” and “spectacularly bad.”
While congressional Democrats did their best to make it sound like they were sad about the formalization of the impeachment inquiry, MSNBC’s Jason Johnson had a different take. Appearing on Thursday’s Deadline: White House, Johnson declared “I may be in the minority here. I’m not somber today. I’m thrilled.”
All kinds of Democrats said it, so why not their allies in the media? I’m speaking here of the media chorus that insisted — insisted — that what President Trump, in an Oval Office address to the nation in January called a “humanitarian crisis” at the border — was in fact nothing more than a “manufactured crisis.”
Steve Schmidt has been reminded what it's like to be a Republican. The former GOP operative, who spent most of his time as an MSNBC analyst bashing the Republican Party, recently quit his own “bulls***” podcast after the show’s co-host grilled him on supporting a third party candidate.
This week, NewsBusters is recounting the most obnoxious liberal bias of 2018. Today, it’s a look at the media’s Trump Derangement Syndrome as we present the most over-the-top attacks on President Donald Trump. When he wasn’t being compared to tyrants like Benito Mussolini, he was being branded a traitor who sold out America to Vladimir Putin. And of course he was repeatedly tarred as a hateful racist.
For the past month, talking heads on CNN and MSNBC have repeated numerous outright falsehoods about the Central American caravan: namely, that it is comprised of “mostly women and children”; that there is “no evidence” of criminals participating; and that none of those marching north are “economic migrants.” An MRC analysis of cable news coverage also identified eight instances in which panelists brazenly claimed that the existence of the caravan was itself a conspiracy theory.
During Friday’s edition of Real Time With Bill Maher, the eponymous host sat down with Garry Kasparov, co-author of a new book called Fight For Liberty: Defending Democracy in the Age of Trump. Kasparov asserted that President Trump’s re-election would signal the “demise of democracy.” Maher agreed, predicting that Trump is “not going to leave even if he loses the election,” kind of an ironic point to make as Democrats across the country refuse to concede in a series of elections where they have no path to victory.
Despite the eventual projections that Democrats would retake the House of Representatives on Tuesday night, NBC News was still uneasy, admitting that “Donald Trump and his followers are still intact” and “there is not a blue tsunami” that could be because of the unpopularity of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.
Earth to Oliver Darcy, Don Lemon, Jim Rutenberg, Steve Schmidt, and Brian Stelter: Call your offices! Despite attempts by Morning Consult and Politico Thursday morning to put a spin on the findings of their latest poll, their poll found that more Americans blame the news media (by an eight-point margin) for dividing the American people than President Trump.
In the aftermath of Saturday’s synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh, liberal cable hosts hurried to place blame for the shooter’s actions at the feet of conservative media outlets, on the grounds that they had recklessly “radicalized” the American right. Whether unwittingly or otherwise, the left-wing pundit class have crafted their own “enemy of the people” narrative — one which endeavors to hold purveyors of right-wing talking points responsible for the senseless slaughter of eleven civilians.